Blackberry Blossom (4)
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BLACKBERRY BLOSSOM [4]. AKA and see "Garfield's Blackberry Blossom." Old-Time, Reel. USA, Kentucky. G Dorian. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB: AABB' (Silberberg): AABBCC (Ed Hayley). This tune is simply labelled "Blackberry Blossom" on older recordings, but has picked up the nomen (perhaps originating with John Hartford) "Garfield's Blackberry Blossom" to distinguish it from the Arthur Smith tune (a related, later tune). Kentucky fiddler Dick Burnett said he learned his version "from a blind fiddler in (Ashland,) Johnson County, (eastern) Ky., named Ed Haley" (elsewhere Burnett said he actually learned the tune from northeastern fiddler Bob Johnson, who had it from Haley {1883-1951}, who was a legendary fiddler in east Kentucky). The tune was in fact Haley's signature tune, much associated with him, although he never commercially recorded it (Mark Wilson & Guthrie Meade, 1976).
A story about the origin of the Garfield title comes from Jean Thomas's book Ballad Makin' in the Mountains of Kentucky, collected perhaps from several sources. It seems that a General Garfield named the tune during the Civil War after hearing a soldier playing it on the harmonica. He remarked to the musician that it was his favorite tune but said he couldn't remember the title, whereupon he expectorated a stream of tobacco juice onto a white blackberry bush blossom; this was noticed and the tune named. As improbable as that story sounds, the tradition of General Garfield's liking for the tune was insisted on by Fiddlin' Ed Morrison on his Library of Congress recording (an influential version); he says Garfield used to whistle the tune frequently and it was Morrison's harmonica-playing father who as a boy picked it up from the General. Betty Vornbrock and others have noted a similarity between "Garfield's Blackberry Blossom" and the West Virginia tune "Yew Piney Mountain (1)," a variant. This version is also played by Kentucky fiddlers J.P. Fraley and and Santford Kelly, has been recorded by Owen "Snake" Chapman. Jean Thomas recorded the tune for the Library of Congress in 1930 from fiddler Ed Morrison (Boyd County, Ky.) at the American Folk Song Festival (AFS 300A).
Sources for notated versions: (Buddy Thomas (Ky.) [Phillips]; a home recording of Ed Haley (Ashland, Boyd County, Kentucky) by his son Ralph [Titon]; Scott Marckx [Silberberg].
Printed sources: Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes), vol. 1, 1994; p. 27. Silberberg (Tunes I Learned at Tractor Tavern), 2002; p. 11. Titon (Old Time Kentucky Fiddle Tunes), 2001; No. 10, p. 43.
Recorded sources: Burning Wolf 001, Reed Island Rounders - "Wolves in the Wood." Columbia 15567-D (78 RPM), (Dick) Burnett and (Oscar) Ruttledge (1930). Document-DOCD-8025, Burnett & Rutherford. Heritage XXXIII, Buddy Thomas - "Visits" (1981). Rounder 0378, Owen "Snake" Chapman - "Up in Chapman's Hollow" (1996). Rounder 1004, "Ramblin' Rickless Hobo: The Songs of Dick Burnett and Leonard Rutherford." Rounder 1133, Ed Haley vol 2 - "Grey Eagle".
See also listing at:
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [1]
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